Does This Darkness Have a Name?
by eastcomptonclover
Summary: After nearly dying at the hands of Ra's Al Ghul, Thea was healed by the powers of the Lazarus Pit however, no one had thought to read the warning label. The Lazarus Pit transformed Thea into someone, something, darker and no one knows how far she's willing to go or if they have even slightest chance of saving her. (Thea-Centric, Semi-Canon)
1. The Death of Thea Queen

Thea Queen didn't raise a hand to Ra's Al Ghul because she thought she would win. She didn't use every single thing her father taught her with anger aching her bones to escape. She didn't go in for the kill at every opportunity because she knew she would walk away. She did it because Thea Queen knew she was going to die and she sure as hell wouldn't be doing it without a fight.

She wished he had just killed her, a bullet to the brain would have sufficed and it would have been cleaner, faster. If the league wasn't so pretentious in their gun ban Thea would have been dead already. Instead there was a sharp pain in her side, a pain that distracted her from the glass stuck in her legs and the blood leaking from her lip, a pain that motivated her to make her last dying effort a call to the one person who always swooped in to save her - her brother.

As she laid there and bled out, Thea realized that the "life flashing before your eyes" cliche is complete bullshit. The only thing flashing through her eyes were a colorful assortment of torture ideas for Ra's Al Ghul himself. He had denied her the privilege of a quick death and the only thing worse than dying was being stuck to drown in her own whirlwind of thoughts as her consciousness waned and her body grew weaker.

She really thought she would have made it to 25; if Thea hadn't been bleeding out all over her fluffy white carpet, she would have laughed. That seemed to be the Queen family tradition: death by sword. Her father (her _real_ father, Robert) being the only exception, respectively. He just had to go and swipe the "get out of stabbing free" card, huh?

It took all her might to keep her eyes from fluttering close. But maybe her eyes closing shut for one last time wouldn't be that bad. With a life tainted by death and tragedy time and time again, it comes as no surprise that a person would spend a lot of time thinking about death and what comes after it. After the death of her mother, Thea concluded that there was no heaven and no God, at least, not a very benevolent one. However, when you can feel your pulse weakening, your ideas on the stance seem to become muddled. Maybe there was a heaven waiting for her, a heaven with her mother and father and Tommy and Sara. Then, after a long while she'd see Oliver, Roy and Laurel and they'd all be eternally young and beautiful and happy, sipping mojitos on an ethereal beach and waving as Tupac and Marilyn Monroe walked by.

But even with her mind beginning to flicker, she knew that was Pure Thea talking. The Thea who hadn't been defaced with trauma, who hadn't heard a knife slicing through her own mother or was constantly picking up the pieces of her shattered life, watching as they cut her fingers time and time again, reopening sealed wounds. That Thea was gone. Maybe forever. Even if she survived (unlikely), that Thea was never coming back and, as she lay on her death bed (well, floor), she realized that she was okay with that.

Thea took a shallow, shaky breath and let her eyes flutter close.

* * *

A pair of heavy footsteps interrupted the deafening silence of Thea's loft. Those footsteps turned into an erratic run.

"Oh my god, Thea!"

"You're gonna be okay…. You're gonna be okay…"

Oliver Queen had survived 5 years of hell, being orphaned, the death of his best friend and the death of his ex girlfriend, but he wasn't sure if he would be able to survive this.


	2. What The Water Gave Me

The memories of being chastely kissed by Death have dulled and faded but the memory of escaping Death's choking embrace is forever branded into her mind. She was being lulled to sleep, feeling herself fade away into oblivion and then there was a bright light, but not the ones they talk about in movies. It was hard and bright and violent, overpowering Death itself in the fight for Thea's soul and then suddenly, she could breath again.

Confusion. Fear. _Anger._

It all hit her at once, overwhelming her mind with emotion until she finally relinquished control to an unfamiliar force inside her, letting it steer her body like a marionette. The foreign force, whatever it was, was feral and heavy and all consuming in her chest, in the pit of her stomach and had begun rapidly spreading itself until it was downright suffocating. She didn't protest as the aggressive energy violently flowed through her body in a fashion that would give a typhoon a run for its money. She barely had time to wonder where the hell she was or who hated her enough to drape her in this unflattering dress before that dark force, allied with those dark parts of herself that she shoved deep inside in the hopes that neglect would eventually smother them whispered in her ear, so softly and sweetly to scratch the eyes out of the first person she spotted. And it convinced her that it felt good.

Suddenly, there were hands on her, yanking her off but Thea was remorseless with bared teeth, swinging arms and a wild look in her eyes that it made it clear that Thea Queen was nowhere to be found. Luckily for her victim, a man she didn't even seem to know or care enough to recognize, the only thing more powerful than someone fresh out of the Lazarus Pit just so happened to be a high dosage of sedatives.

* * *

 _It was just the pit_ , Oliver had told himself over and over again but he couldn't brush off that looming feeling that something was dreadfully wrong. Sure, he had succeeded in bringing Thea back but at what cost? Malcolm himself had said there would be side effects, consequences…. But this was _Thea_. This was Speedy… If there was a chance to bring her back he had no choice but to try, Oliver reassured himself as he rubbed the back of his neck pensively. He would do anything to bring his sister back, even if it meant selling his soul to the devil himself, which, in this case - it did.

* * *

By the time she had finally come to once more, she was in yet another change of clothes and in yet another foreign place. Everything felt heavy and hazy, she attempted to sit up but her head lolled back in defiance. "Where.. Where am I?" Thea asked hoarsely, lazily scanning the room which was nothing more than a blur of darkened colors and ultimately, not the most comforting sight. A hesitant hand settling itself on hers gave her the energy to shoot upright, her heavy breaths an indicator of how hard that actually was in her inhibited state.

"Hey, you're okay, you're alright." A soothing voice came to her aid, attempting comfort her by reaching to smooth down her bedhead but as the hand neared she flinched not only out of instinct but because she was threatened. She didn't know him, she didn't know where she was or what was happening and she didn't know why she felt so… Empty.

"I don't know you." Thea stated to the man whose face fell the second she jerked her body away from his.

"Thea it's me… It's Ollie." The man - _Ollie_ \- said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Thea blinked in response before shutting her eyes in frustration and grabbing at her own hair as if she was trying to pull out the swarm of confusion and unsteady thoughts out of her brain. When had her thoughts become so loud?

Ollie and another man were quick to restrain her in fear that she'd resorted to hurting herself but that wasn't what they should be afraid of.

* * *

It took some coaxing (a sedative that could take down an elephant) to finally get Thea to rest but once she did, things began to make sense.

Her name was Thea Dearden Queen, daughter of Malcolm Merlyn and Moira Queen, sister to Oliver Queen and she should be dead.

However, by the time she had finally realized this, the brunette was already looking at (what she had later learned was) Nanda Parbat through an airplane window and while everyone else seemed to be grieving the loss of Oliver, Thea was unresponsive. No, she wasn't "staying strong" and holding back tears as there were no tears to hold back. She thought back to all the times she would chase after Oliver and never let him leave her side or beg him to let her stay up with him and Tommy and the heartfelt memories that should have left her with at least a frown had no effect. She hadn't even felt a pang of guilt for feeling nothing. Once upon a time, she would have be in hysterics over the loss of her only living family member (except Malcolm - she never counted Malcolm) but now the only thing she seemed to feel was that dark sensation, that feral hunger growing and festering beyond her control. And she let it.

* * *

Thea had ignored the dozens of calls from Roy and Laurel who both offered their company to comfort her in this "grieving time" but she ignored every call and every text in favor of solitude. No one had even bothered to clean her apartment that seemed to now be forever stained with her blood which was, dare she say, _illuminated_ in the light of the cozy fire place.

This is where the fatal blow had happened.

She almost instinctively reached to brush her fingers over what should have been a lethal gash but what was now smooth, pale skin just like the rest of her.

Oliver just couldn't have just let her die, could he? He just had to go play hero like always and hadn't even taken into account that maybe, just maybe, his choice wasn't always the right one. Taking a dip in the magic hot tub might have brought back her body but it was like her soul hadn't tagged along for the ride. God, hadn't he ever seen pet cemetery? There was something raw and evil pounding against her chest, clawing at her flesh, eager for escape and she couldn't stop it, not even if she wanted to.

* * *

"Now, what's a pretty lady like you doing drinking all alone?" A deep voice asked Thea who tossed him a smirk in response, that effortless rich girl smirk she had perfected over five years of snorting away her problems. A smirk that nearly convinced her all was normal, and that Thea was all there.

"Maybe I'm just waiting for a handsome guy to come along and join me." She replied with the crossing and uncrossing of her lean legs, making a show of coyly tucking a short brown hair behind her ear. "Or maybe," she paused, taking a sip of her margarita as her green eyes flickered to the man's face who seemed to be hanging onto her every word. With so many years wasted on dealing with Roy, she'd forgotten just how easy men were. "Maybe, I'm not so interested in the drink but rather what comes after it." she finished nonchalantly.

"Never been much of a drinker myself." The man admitted with a smirk that he might have believed was suave and charming but anyone with half a brain could see the underlying desperate excitement.

In response, Thea hopped off the bar stool, throwing a bill on the counter before sauntering out of the bar - she didn't even have to glance behind her to know this man was trailing her like a lost puppy until she'd finally stopped in the alley outside the bar.

"Out here? You don't wanna go someplace, uh, more private?" The man asked hesitantly.

"My place is a little messy as it is, wouldn't wanna stain anything." Thea shrugged, batting her eyelashes up at him and before he even had the chance of firing back a perverted, half witted reply, she had him by the throat: a knife in her left hand, his throat in her right while her knee rested comfortably right on his crotch. He struggled against the smaller woman but it really didn't make much of a difference and if anything, only magnified Thea's bloodlust. "Wait… A-Aren't you… Aren't you Thea Q-Queen?" The man choked out with the furrowing of his eyebrows. Sure, she had that crazy look in her eyes, but he had seen her on the cover of the local gossip rag mags one too many times to mistake her for anyone else.

"Yeah, I am. And those were some shitty last words." Thea chuckled before slitting his throat. She didn't budge when his blood sprayed all over her skin and the scrap of a fabric she called a dress in fact, she savored it.

For the first time since it had crawled inside of her, the darkness was finally satisfied and surprisingly enough, so was she.


	3. Dead Girl Walking

Her skin glints under the fluorescent lights and only Thea Queen can manage to maintain a willowy beauty about her as she wrestles a man's lifeless body behind a dumpster. An underrated talent.

No one gave a second glance at the blood splattered girl walking down the street in her skimpy dress, six inch heels dangling from one hand, a dagger in the other. Thea hardly took this as a surprise: this was the _Glades_ where no one saw anything and no one knew anyone… Unless it was for a pretty penny, of course. This was where sickness festered and infected the city. This was her home.

The first thing she had done when she got back to her apartment was ignore the blood - _her blood_ \- that clung to the fluffy white carpet. Instead, she lit her fireplace and let her fingertips wander dangerously close to the flickering flames, each hint of heat reminding her she could feel pain, that she was alive. She burns her pretty dress and washes off a stranger's blood and acts like everything is normal again because that's what Queens do. That's what Queens are good at. Thea makes her way to the bathroom, stripping off her underwear and avoiding glimpses at her blood stained reflection in the mirror. The water is scalding and she's only in the shower long enough for the bright red on her skin to fade into nothingness and slide down the drain before she can't breathe again. Before she feels life and death fighting over her body, fighting for her soul like it had only days ago. It's a warzone in her mind but Thea is on the losing side and the water won't stop pounding against her skin, the water won't let up and she's finding herself curled up in the corner of the tub, the steady stream of water washing the tears from her face. She's weak and she knows it but she can't bring herself to stop, she can't bring herself to think of anything other than The Pit.

Thea is barely able to drag herself out of the shower without curling into fetal position and it sickens her. Everything she's done leading up to this shell of a person she's become was all in order to be strong, to stop being in the damsel in distress but look at her now: breaking down at the first memory of what she'd been through. It was pathetic. It was weak. It proved everything had been done in vain.

When she sees Sara is when she knows she's really gone off the deep end but nevertheless, the older woman stands above her, dressed in black spandex and a blonde wig cascading down her back. The smirk spread across her pink lips looks taunting and far from the deer in headlights look she had on her face when Thea had an arrow trained on her.

"What, poor little rich girl can't take a little resurrection?" Sara taunts, "At least you got a second chance. Look at me, Thea: I'm dead. I'm dead, and you're alive and the first thing you do is _kill someone_. What kind of twisted humor is that, huh?" Sara circles her like a lioness hunting her prey and Thea can't find that rabid blood lust in her, not when she's being confronted with her own truths, her own demons. All she can do is listen.

"You're not real." Thea chokes out, a feeble attempt to shoo away Sara (but she's _not_ Sara, Sara's **dead** ).

"You're right, I'm not." Sara offers the brunette a lackadaisical shrug, "You're just _crazy_. A crazy, psycho kiler. Admit it. Admit it!" Sara's lethargy is gone in seconds and reminds Thea that killing Sara had been a lucky shot. Sara was a lioness at heart, always ready to rip away at her prey and right now, Thea was no longer the hunter.

"I couldn't… I couldn't stop it." Her chest heaves and for the second time tonight, she struggles to breathe.

"Bullshit." Sara crouches down to look Thea, staring into her widened eyes, "The Thea I know wouldn't have killed that asshole. The Thea I know wouldn't have killed _me_." The words were spat and Thea focused on counting the tiles of her bathroom floor.

"Maybe I'm not the Thea you know anymore." The words fall out of her mouth hushed and whispered as if she's revealing a great secret and not talking to herself, naked, on her bathroom floor.

"Really?" Sara scoffs, "Then who are you? _What_ are you?" The blonde woman probes until Thea is forced to choke out a half sob of an answer: "I'm not innocent anymore."

* * *

The next day, Thea shows up at the doorstep of the first person who had expected to see her: Malcolm Merlyn. It wasn't because he's her father, he's never been her father, it's because she has nothing left to lose. Her sanity had drowned in that pit and even if she could contact Oliver, he couldn't provide what Malcolm could. While Oliver would attempt to smooth her ragged edges, Malcolm would sharpen them. She needed to be trained, to be bred into something more than herself because she's hollow and empty and if she can't be a real person then she'll be a weapon.

Malcolm is hardly surprised to open the door and see Thea waiting on his doorsteps, he's hardly surprised to see something cold and dark behind vacant green eyes. He is, however, surprised to hear what she has to say.

"You look well, Thea." He lies and she can see right through him, he knows this.

Her eyes narrow and she doesn't bother with formalities as she enters his home, picking up the first weapon she sees: a sword. It's sturdy and heavy and sharp enough to slice her finger. That's what she'll need, a sword: a sword represents fatality in one strike, it's a far cry from the bow and arrow she wielded as a child or the one that Oliver uses in the name of vigilante justice. The sword is her own to wield, her own tool of destruction. After a moment, she puts down the sword in favor another object: a mask. A wide grin paints its face, taunting Thea as if it knew something she didn't as green eyes search it with mild interest.

"You told me something." Thea says suddenly as she watches her finger drag along the ridges of the mask, "You told me I shouldn't come back if I didn't want to. You were right." She doesn't bother to look at Malcolm's reaction before continuing her spiel, "Malcolm, once upon a time I came to you because thought you were the only person who wouldn't lie to me. I knew every bad thing you had done and I didn't _trust_ you but I tolerated you because you didn't lie to me, you didn't betray me. Now I know better. I don't trust anyone."

"Why are you here, Thea?" Malcolm's voice is the only thing that dares to interrupt her speech.

"It's not to be your daughter or your soldier - it's to be your partner. You have contacts and if I'm going to be a mercenary, that's what I'll need. You're going to give me your contacts and do you know why, _dad?_ " The bitterness stings her tongue, "You're the only person I know who's going to accept me no matter how many throats I slit. You'd be a hypocrite not to." Her attention is finally dragged away from her mask and she can't tell if Malcolm is pleased or terrified. She doesn't care. All Thea knows is that some crucial part of her was still in the pit and there was no turning back, the demons were here and they were pushing and prying until she was forced to become someone else, _something_ else: a catalyst for her need to inflict pain and to feel it, the embodiment of her broken soul. She needed to become _**Cheshire**_.


End file.
